January 30, 1885.] 



SCIENCE. 



93 



Altogether, this systematic use of the balloon 

 for the study of special meteorological condi- 

 tions must be regarded as a new departure ; 

 and the signal-service is to be congratulated 

 on its successful initiation. 



THE KOWAK RIVER. 



The map opposite shows the explorations 

 made by the U. S. revenue marine on the 

 Kowak or Kuak River during the season of 

 1884. The asterisk indicates the farthest ex- 

 plored point on the river. The native settle- 

 ments are shown by small black triangles. 

 The course of the lower part of the Selawik 

 River and part of the Kowak delta, indicated 

 in dotted lines, have not been explored. It 

 will be observed that the new explorations al- 

 most exactly join the course of the river as 

 laid down on the coast-surve}' map of 1884 \>y 

 Dall, from Woolfe and Jaeobsen's sketch-map. 

 The spelling of the names on the above map 

 has not been modified to agree with the Innuit 

 pronunciation as obtained by Lieut. Cantwell, 

 since the different tribes of the region do not 

 pronounce these names uniformly, and the 

 names ; Kowak ' and ' Selawik ' have been 

 adopted on all charts for many years. Accord- 

 ing to Lieut. Cantwell, the people of the river 

 call it Ku-ak (or ' big river'). Other names 

 are Shelawik (Selawik, or ' fish ') lake and river, 

 Imogarik'-choit (lake or 'little sea'). The 

 stream connecting this with Selawik River 

 is Ig'-yak ('throat') River: that flowing to 

 Selawik Lake is Ki-ak'-tuk ('fox') River. 

 Others have been referred to in our report of 

 this exploration. It is probable that the upper 

 part of the Selawik, taken from the Western 

 union explorations of 1866-67, is too far to 

 the westward, and that the course of the river 

 is less irregular than above indicated ; but 

 there are not sufficient data to make this certain, 

 or to alter the chart at present. 



A GLANCE AT THE HISTORY OF OUR 

 KNOWLEDGE OF FOSSIL PLANTS. 1 



The ancients, though acquainted with fossil shells 

 and corals, were wholly ignorant of fossil plants ; and 

 the first mention of any vegetable substance in a state 

 of petrifaction was made by Albertus Magnus about 

 the middle of the thirteenth century. Agricola, Ges- 

 ner, and others treated of petrified wood in the six- 

 teenth century; and, during the seventeenth, Major 

 in Germany, and notably Lhwyd in England, called 



1 Read before the American association for the advancement 

 of reienee, Sept. 8, 1884, by Lester F. Ward. 



attention to the existence of vegetable impressions 

 in the rocks. By the beginning of the eighteenth 

 century considerable collections of such material ex- 

 isted in the European museums, and this had become 

 the subject of animated discussion. Dendrite had 

 long been known, and was then generally supposed 

 to represent vegetable matter; but in the year 1700 

 Scheucbzer overthrew that doctrine, and established 

 its purely mineral character. 



Prior to this date the prevailing notions of the 

 times ascribed all fossils to some mysterious cause, 

 and denied their reality as the remains of things that 

 had once possessed life. As to their true nature, 

 there was, however, no harmony of opinion. Some 

 looked upon them as divinely created archetypes of 

 living things, others as divine enigmas placed before 

 man to test his faith, others still as merely the varied 

 forms of the subterranean world corresponding to 

 those of the earth's surface, while many regarded such 

 objects as purely accidental, or as mere freaks of 

 nature. 



Against these predominant mystic views there had, 

 however, long existed the theory that these forms, so 

 strikingly similar to real things, might be the petri- 

 fied remains of the life that perished by the Noachian 

 deluge, and which had been stranded on the moun- 

 tains and highlands of Europe and Asia. This view 

 was countenanced by Martin Luther, and strongly 

 defended by Alexander ab Alexandro in the sixteenth 

 century; while towards the close of the seventeenth 

 it secured many earnest advocates, including Wood- 

 ward of England, and Scheucbzer of Switzerland. 

 The latter undertook to defend his theory from the 

 evidence furnished by plant-remains ; and from this 

 zeal resulted his greatest work, one of the most re- 

 markable of the time, — his ' Herbarium diluvianum.' 

 This appeared in 1709, and in it are enumerated and 

 figured many fossil plants. These impressions were 

 declared to be those of existing and often familiar 

 species; and we find among them the myrrh of Scrip- 

 ture, Galium, Hippuris, and other well-known forms. 

 So confident was Scheucbzer that these were living 

 plants, that in 1718 he ventured to classify all known 

 impressions according to Tournefort's system, as 

 drawn up in his 'Elemens de botanique' in 1694. 

 The new edition of the 'Herbarium diluvianum,' 

 which appeared in 1723, contained this systematic 

 table, in which four hundred and forty-five species 

 are enumerated. 



This bold stroke aroused an intense interest in the 

 subject, and immediately led to a closer comparison 

 of the fossil with the living flora. In this work, 

 Leibnitz in 1706, and Antoine de Jussieu in 1718, had 

 already led the way by examining certain well-defined 

 impressions, and expressing strong doubts of then- 

 identity with any European species. Further inves- 

 tigations were made ; and these disagreements soon 

 gave rise to the belief that they were tropical forms 

 which by some convulsion or vicissitude had been 

 brought to Europe, and buried under its soil. This 

 view prevailed until the close of the eighteenth cen- 

 tury. 



Thus far the idea of ancient or extinct life had 



